The story of a retired crazy who seems to be able to find one adventure after another.

The day starts with a big TSD stage, the 11% grade. This stage was run in the 2012 Winter Alcan and because of a fatal highway accident, the stage was canceled and the rally was split in two. This year there are no problems and after Colin and I do our checkpoint, we continue on to Dease Lake.

Along the way the rally has a second TSD, the Blackwater TSD, which dumps the rally into the famous Blackwater Run. The Blackwater Run is a 110 mile forest road the is more single/dual track than road. It is one of the greatest roads in the Canadian north. In the winter. In the summer, not so much.

Colin and I don’t have a checkpoint on the Blackwater TSD so we carry on to Dease Lake. But the competitors do the Run and the after action report that night at the MTC is very favorable. If they really liked that, we think, they should do the Winter. Few roads compare to the Blackwater Run in the depths of winter.

The fires are now a quite close to Dease Lake and as recently as last week, we weren’t sure that the rally would be able to get through Dease Lake which was then under a mandatory evacuation order. Luckily for us (but not so much for the locals), the evacuation order had been lifted for Dease Lake and we continue up the Cassiar Highway across the Yukon border.

Though the evacuation order has been lifted, the smoke is so bad on the way up to Dease Lake, that some sections of the road are dark enough to appear like dusk after sunset. There are instant tent camps set up for the firefighters and the only gas station is jammed.

The Alcan south of 37 Junction has been closed because of a fire that stretched across the Alcan so the usual southbound Alcan traffic has been diverted down the Cassiar. We fuel up and head for the Yukon border, a favorite photo stop. By the time we get to the border the smoke has disappeared and the sky is back to a mid-afternoon overcast day. The truck stills stinks of smoke but at least the visibility has improved.

The route itinerary shows us doing Telegraph Creek but the road to Telegraph Creek is closed and the entire Telegraph Creek area is under a mandatory evacuation order. That’s probably good turn, though. It’s already mid-afternoon and the Telegraph Creek round trip is between 3 and 4 hours. I’ve never made it to Telegraph Creek and I’m disappointed, but if we did the round trip, we’d arrive in Watson Lake at around 11 PM and that probably means no dinner and we’ve already missed lunch. Maybe some other time.

At 37 Junction we take a left and head to Stewart, BC where we’ll spend the night. The road down to Stewart is spectacular and though we come this way in the winter rally, no one ever goes down to Stewart because of the potential for an avalanche to cut off Stewart for days at a time.

Avalanches aren’t a problem in the summer, obviously, and we cruise into town about 8:30. Check into the hotel and head to the Eldorado Pizza joint for a pretty good pizza and the required beers, Rickard’s Red. Then back to the hotel for some sleep. Gotta get it when you can. There are probably going to be some late nights later in the rally.